Ident ideas



steaky jakey

The ident idea i have gone for is steaky jakey productions. The idea is a cartoon of me, sniffing a steak! and going mmmm. i have another idea, which is a stake(wooden stake). stabbing the steak, which is the slasher/zombie genre coming into play. i come up with the idea from thinking of any wacky idea that links into me. We will use live type to create our animation, which will be like a cartoon.

here are the key aspects of an Ident:

• Music/sound (mine will be very upbeat and jolly, very comic non-diegetic music
• Graphic (mine will be a steak with a cartoon of me)
• Name (Steaky Jakey)
• Animation (me animated sniffing a steak, and going mmmm)

I will then take all my ideas and using live type try put everything together to create a unique ident!

Final girl concept

Men, Women and Chainsaws: The Final Girl

The final girl is a thriller and horror film (particularly slasher) trope that specifically refers to the last woman or girl alive to confront the killer, ostensibly the one left to tell the story. The term was coined by Carol J. Clover in her book Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film. Clover suggests that in these films, the viewer begins by sharing the perspective of the killer, but experiences a shift in identification to the final girl partway through the film. The final girl has been observed in dozens of films, including Halloween, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Hellraiser, Alien and Scream.

Examples of final girls

Before the release of Alien 3, Clover identified Ellen Ripley from the Alien franchise as a final girl. Elizabeth Ezra continues this analysis for Alien Resurrection, arguing that by definition both Ripley and Annalee Call must be final girls, and that Call is the "next generation of Clover's Final Girl". Call, in Ezra's view, exhibits traits that fit Clover's definition of a final girl, namely that she is boyish, having a short masculine-style haircut, and that she is characterized by (in Clover's words) "smartness, gravity, competence in mechanical and other practical matters, and sexual reluctance" being a ship's mechanic who rejects the sexual advances made by male characters on the ship. Ezra notes, however, that this identification of Call as a final girl is marred by the fact that she is not a human being, but an android.

Christine Cornea disputes the idea that Ripley is a final girl, contrasting Clover's analysis of the character with that of Barbara Creed, who presents Ripley as "the reassuring face of womanhood". Cornea does not accept either Clover's or Creed's views on Ripley. Whilst she accepts Clover's general thesis of the final girl convention, she argues that Ripley does not follow the conventions of the slasher film, as Alien follows the different conventions of the science fiction film genre. In particular, there is not the foregrounding in Alien, as there is in the slasher film genre, of the character's sexual purity and abstinence relative to the other characters (who would be, in accordance with the final girl convention, killed by the film's monster "because" of this). The science fiction genre that Alien inhabits, according to Cornea, simply lacks this kind of sexual theme in the first place, it not having a place in such "traditional" science fiction formats.

Laurie Strode (from Halloween I, II, and H20) is another example of a final girl. Tony Williams notes that Clover's image of supposedly progressive final girls are never entirely victorious at the culmination of a film nor do they manage to eschew the male order of things as Clover argues. He holds up Strode as an example of this. She is rescued by a male character, Dr. Samuel Loomis, at the end of Halloween. He holds up Lila Crane, from Psycho, as another example of a final girl who is saved by a male (also named Sam Loomis) at the end of the film. On this basis he argues that whilst 1980s horror film heroines were more progressive than those of earlier decades, the gender change is done conservatively, and the final girl convention cannot be regarded as a progressive one "without more thorough investigation".

Williams also gives several examples of final girls from the Friday the 13th franchise: Alice from Friday the 13th, and the heroines from Part II and Part III. (He observes that Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter does not have a final girl.) He notes that they do not conclude the films wholly victorious, however. The heroines from Parts 2 and 3 are catatonic at the ends of the respective films, and Alice survives the monster in the first film only to fall victim to "him" in the second. The final girl in Part 2 is carried away on a stretcher, calling out for her boyfriend (which Williams argues again undermines the notion of final girls always being victorious). Moreover, Ginny's adoption of the monster's own strategy, in Part II, brings into question whether the final girl image is in fact a wholly positive one.

Kearney observes that in the middle 1990s the trope of the final girl in horror films was "resurrected, reshaped, and mainstreamed". She points to Sidney Prescott (in Scream I, II, and III) and Julie James (in I Know What You Did Last Summer and I Still Know What You Did Last Summer) as examples of this.

Other characters identified as final girls include Sally Hardesty of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Nancy Thompson of the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise.

History


According to Clover, the final girl is typically sexually unavailable or virginal, avoiding the vices of the victims (sex, narcotic usage, etc.). She sometimes has a unisex name (e.g., Teddy, Billie, Georgie, Sidney). Occasionally the Final Girl will have a shared history with the killer. The final girl is the "investigating consciousness" of the film, moving the narrative forward and as such, she exhibits intelligence, curiosity, and vigilance.

One of the basic premises of Clover’s theory is that audience identification is unstable and fluid across gender lines, particularly in the case of the slasher film. During the final girl’s confrontation with the killer, Clover argues, she becomes masculinised through "phallic appropriation" by taking up a weapon, such as a knife or chainsaw, against the killer. Conversely, Clover points out that the villain of slasher films is often a male whose masculinity, and sexuality more generally, are in crisis. Examples would include Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Clover points to this gender fluidity as demonstrating the impact of feminism in popular culture.

The phenomenon of the male audience having to identify with a young female character in an ostensibly male-oriented genre, usually associated with sadistic voyeurism, raises interesting questions about the nature of slasher films and their relationship with feminism. Clover argues that for a film to be successful, although the Final Girl is masculinised, it is necessary for this surviving character to be female, because she must experience abject terror, and many viewers would reject a film that showed abject terror on the part of a male. The terror has a purpose, in that the female is 'purged' if she survives, of undesirable characteristics, such as relentless pursuit of pleasure in her own right. An interesting feature of the genre is the 'punishment' of beauty and sexual availability (Leading to the idea that "Sex = Death" in Horror Movies)

how laurie strode defines the final girl archetype

she is very intelligent which is a signifier that she is the final girl. she forgot her biology book at home and got worried about it. her friends laughed the 'scream queens'. she wears not very glamorous clothes long cardigan and white thick tights. usually the final girl is brunette. the scream queen is usually blonde and busty. Usually the final girl is a virgin, however the scream queen usually have and can get a girlfriend unlike the final girl. the final girl is usually responsible unlike the typical scream queen. the binary opposition is smoking and non  smoking between the c=scream queens and the final girl. Her chemistry book is a real big deal for her leaving it.

Sydney Prescott final girl in scream (Wes Craven 1996)

we can denote that her night dress is long old fashioned and childish. we can also denote that when we first see her shes doing her homework. She has got the conventional dark hair, brunette. her rooms very neat, tidy room with no posters it looks like a really 'geeky' room. We get a false scare early on with her boyfriend/crush?

Final girl is virgin the boyfriend is then commenting on that. 'i wouldn't dream of breaking your underwear rule.

Narrative Theories

Todorov's 5-part narrative formula:

Todorov is associated with the theory that every narrative can be broken down into three basic stages: situation, conflict, resolution (or equilibrium, dis-equilibrium, new equilibrium). Crucially, your protagonist is not the same as at the outset, but has been changed in some way from events.

1. A state of equilibrium at the outset.

2. A disruption of the equilibrium by some action.

3. A recofnition that there has been a disruption.

4. An attempt to repair the disruption.

5. A reinstatement of the equilibrium.

Media Language in other Shane Meadow's Films

A Room For Romeo Brass Film Analysis (Shane Meadows, 1999)

Box office information:
Budget - NOT AVAILABLE
Gross - $18,000 (USA)
(Failed to get a UK cinema release)

Company idents:

• Alliance Atlantis Communications.

This film was funded by The Arts Council of England and the BBC. Alot of the low budget indie films like this are funded by these kind of companys. However when you get to the big budget american films it's a very different story! there are very few idents because they do not need the funding. The opening lasts for 1:10, this gives us a hint to what kind of film it is due to the long takes and lack of editing. It is A rural area up north stereotypical of a film produced by WARP. 

 It also for advertising reasons, Says a film by shane meadows, so it's giving him the limelight he is the person people may know due to previous films. The mise en scene was just like most of the WARP film a rural area/ counicl estate, run down with graffiti/litter etc.

Dead Mans Shoes Film Analysis (Shane Meadows, 2004)

Box office information:
Budget - NOT AVAILABLE
Gross - $6,000 (USA)
(Failed to get a UK cinema release)

Company idents:

• Warp Films
• Big Arty Productions
• Film4

It is a very well known film and highly rated by critics (even without a cinema release). The music in non-diegetic, that of an orchestra. The first scene is like a documentary. The footage is on what seems to be a hand held camera, to show that it is someones own filming. it is edited with a crackle effect with black and white, hinting it's the past. There is a flashback montage, from the present day to these videos.

It shows a few videos from the past, a montage. Then repeatedly cuts to the present tense where you are introduced to men in a two shot. It is then the titles and introduces the film with a two shot of what you think are the main characters.

MICRODRAMA: FINISHED FILM + REFLECTION

MICRODRAMA: FINISHED FILM + REFLECTION


The Best part of editing we did was the Ending in which we made the titles look like blood spilling, linking in with the slasher drama we produced, It had fading text that disappeared and splatting blood, this i thought made the film look very professional

Obviously one of the main reasons of a horror film is to make the audience jump/ be scared. We though of many ways in doing this. We took into account what Danny Cohen said at the York film festival; natural light is a mans best friend.

So when Started the scene off in the Dark where you couldn't see me, the murderer (shot above). Then turned the light on, revealing me to the audience to create a shock you might of seen coming. I thought this was really effective, Never the less it could of been more effective if i was nearer the victim creating more of a certain death situation. It also could of been more scary if we had more shot variety and a POV it missed key elements to make it that even more scary. This is shown in psycho shower scene Alot of shot variety           make murder scenes alot more realistic and scary!

We Used a High angles shot early on in the film to hint that the characters are very vulnerable and a hint that later on in the film something may happen. In many horror films this happens, little clues that something just isn't quite right, this can also be acheieved by a Dutch angle which we missed an opportunity to use, which i think i will definitely use in a future project.

We used hints through the whole film to suggest that someone lived in the house (this been the reason for the killings). We used it here very well with the dialogue in the drama. saying (Lads we got loads of food!) suggesting someone lives here.

Another thing we tried to do was show at the start of the film something scary on the TV however through technical difficulties couldnt find a horror movie. This is used in alot of scary films, showing horrors to give a hint to the audience. However we found something 'sci-fi' which was the best we could find it worked well because it showed someone had been in the house very recently which gives you a chill up the spine.

Again we took into account the lighting. It look perfect for this shot as it shows a dark basement from it point of view. it looks scary somewhere you wouldn't want to go. it definately creates an atmosphere, used in most movies with natural lighting.

Here we showed the hand of the murderer with blood on his hands Signifies hes killed the victim, without showing him dead. It adds great effect and i think it's a great way to end the scene. However we realised from advice an even better way to end the scene would to cut from the light been switched of to someone putting a drink down in the next scene

We then did another scene to try make the viewer scared this time showing the Killers legs, so you know what coming, this creates a real scare for the audience! we closed the fridge and revealed the characters body.

one bad part of the film was the first murder scene, it was way too un-realistic, it just didn't work. The actual axing of the charachter showed no blood and was just too amateur. We tried to make it more realistic by adding effects to it like the stabbing sound effect. Although that added more of a comic element which we didn't want

All in all i think for a first effort we did really well to create such a good micro-drama for a first effort. We have learnt many things we should do in our next project from mistakes we have made in this one. It was definately a great learning curve doing this micro-drama

MICRODRAMA: EDITING

MICRODRAMA: EDITING 

Our editing was split into two groups, one group(Me, George, Ben, Curtis) and another group (Dec, James, Dom)

A few of the problems encountered were when we were editing it's one person on the computer at a time so it was just one person doing everything and everyone just giving input on how to do it. This meant that people got less of a chance to practice on Final Cut.

We then imported all our footage from the memory card into the computer's hardrive, then into Final Cut, It then appears in the Final Cut Library ready to edit and do whatever you want with it. They appear across a timeline easy to move across and play with the audio.

We then messed around with different titles. There are several motions, colours, fonts etc. We played with different effects seeing which ones would fit in with the film. It was good to see what you could do with the software aswell, there were so many options of different animations and text motions. We then decided on using The ' black ink ' animation which was originally white background with ink falling down and splattering. However we took the opportunity to use initiative And turn the background black on the ink red, this gave it a great blood effect that works so nicely with the film.

We then looked at how we could make the murder scenes more realistic to the viewer. We first thought about doing blood effects, this was too difficult to look even slightly realistic. So we decided to go with sound. We looked to see if there were any sound effects that would match our murder scenes. We looked down and we found it! the stab sound effect, this worked very well for our drama, never the less it wasn't as realistic as we would of hoped.

.

MICRODRAMA: THE SHOOT

MICRODRAMA: THE SHOOT

We did the shoot at Ben Brearley's house to film our Micro Drama. A house that could be potentially scary as you can make it scary by using different lighting etc. We then arranged to meet by social networking, which instantly created a problem as people didn't know when we were meeting up because they hadn't ready it.

Suitcase Scene which proved difficult

 We encountered many problems while shooting. One of the problems was when shooting the first scene when the 'Lads' are taking the suitcases into the house. We wanted to get the sound of the suitcases into the take. However with the sound of the cars that was pretty hard. So we had to wait for the cars to come passed, delaying our schedule. Another problem was, we were in someones house, so things like family photos and things that weren't scary had to be hidden.



As Danny Cohen said in the York film festival 'natural light is a cinematographers best friend', this was not the case sometimes in our shooting process! Alot of the time it was too dark to see anything on the camera. so with some intelligence we used a phone light to help film. We originally were going to do a few scenes outside, however the weather wasn't good enough at all. We couldn't film anything outside because of the resources we had. This changed our original story and had to use our creative minds to compensate, changing some of the murder scenes.

For our shooting as i was the killer i filmed the start of the film until George gets killed. Then i handed over to George to do the filming. So me and him were the directors, choosing which shots to partake in. Then we chose the order in which the people get killed, choosing who would be the best person for each murder scene. There were 5 'lads' (Dom, George, Curtis, Ben, Dec and one killer, me)

What was impressive about our shoot was that we had NO script and not much planning, which we now know we need to thing about in our next project. We did incredibly well making it up from the top of our heads, however it could have been so much better if we had planned i thoroughly!

The lesson i have learnt is that what we needed to do was plan in advance! this would make the process so much easier. However with very little planning we produced quite a fine specimen.

Micro-Drama: Pitch

Micro-Drama: Pitch
My Micro Drama pitch was a comedy, Similair to Ali G. It was about a boy, Curtis Tiplady. Who run the town of Burley In Wharfedale. However there was a threat to curtis' position in shape of Dom ellis. A competitor to curtis' status as the boy who run the town. Basicly Dom come to burley and took over the bike shed with his 'crew'. There was then a battle to retain the bike shed as curtis' layout. They then proceeded to fight And curtis won over the bike shed once again and retained hios crown.

My plan Is trying to take a comic twist by Making the two characters trying to act like 'Badmen' but it doesn't work. I would of used the mise en scene as the actual burley village and dress the two characters in stereotypical 'chav clothes'

The only negative to my idea is that it wouldn't link in with future tasks. Also it lacks a great storyline, so it may be hard to make funny

Conventions Vodcast

our vodcast on conventions:

This is england Budget, Box office + media language

Budget:

 £1,500,000
Box office:
 £1.3m $320,000

Media Language in Film Opening:

Idents: Optimum releasing, warp films, film four, funds from the national lottery, UK film council, em media, screen Yorkshire, Big arty productions. this tells us its not high budget film. you wouldn't see harry potter been funded by the national lottery.

it starts with a montage of clips from the past, we know they are from the past due to the quality of the camera. It shows mainly Margaret thatcher in not a good light! 

in the titles its a back background with a sans cerif font in white. The letters on the titles look decayed and old. which is all through the film opening; graffiti on the walls, old run down cars and litter on the street. The Directors titles are shown as 'A Shane Meadows film' its like a form of advertising because of the reputation of the director. He is a famous director so people will buy the film. This is why they call it his film.

Trip to York Film Festival

Trip to York film festival
We went on a trip to the York film festival, we went to see 2 masterclasses. First a producer from Warp films celebrating there 10th year in business. The company of Warp films have made 18 feature films, 5 TV series and 6 Baftas. so a very successful film company. here is a list of films by WARP:

Film	Year	Director	Notes
My Wrongs #8245–8249 & 117	2002	Chris Morris	Short film
Dead Man's Shoes	2004	Shane Meadows
Rubber Johnny	2005	Chris Cunningham	Short film
Scummy Man	2006	Paul Fraser	Short film/Music video
This Is England	2006	Shane Meadows
Grow Your Own	2007	Richard Laxton
Dog Altogether	2007	Paddy Considine	Short film
Fur TV	2008	Chris Waitt
A Complete History of My Sexual Failures	2008	Chris Waitt
Arctic Monkeys At the Apollo	2008	Richard Ayoade
Donkey Punch	2008	Oliver Blackburn
The Mighty Boosh Live: Future Sailors Tour	2009	Paul King
Curtains	2009	Julian Barratt	Short film
Hush	2009	Mark Tonderai
Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee	2009	Shane Meadows
Bunny and the Bull	2009	Paul King
All Tomorrow's Parties	2009	All Tomorrow's People & Jonathan Caouette
Four Lions	2010	Chris Morris
This Is England 86	2010	Shane Meadows & Tom Harper	TV
Submarine	2010	Richard Ayoade
Tyrannosaur	2011	Paddy Considine
Kill List	2011	Ben Wheatley
This is England '88	2011	Shane Meadows	TV
The Organ Grinders Monkey	2011	Jake & Dinos Chapman	Short film
Snowtown	2011	Justin Kurzel	Warp Films Australia
The Minor Character	2012	Richard Curson Smith	TV
The Snipist	2012	Matthew Holness	TV
Care	2012	Amanda Boyle	TV
Swimmer	2012	Lynne Ramsay	Short film
The Midnight Beast	2012	Ben Gregor	TV series
Berberian Sound Studio	2012	Peter Strickland

Barry Ryan

Barry ryan was the first masterclass we saw. he mainly talked about what his experiences have been whilst been part of Warp Films. talking about current issues. the future looks like for film makers(what we are doing now in our coursework). He then took some questions at the end leading to a discussion about how most aspiring film makers will not make it like he has, there is too much competition etc. However he seemed really enthusiastic about young film makers, giving advice on what to do when making your own film. He talked about how you shouldn't set out to make a film to be 'cool' you just need a good idea and work on it. He said he wanted to be a director himself however he realised his skills in production and wasn't skilled enough as a director.

He elaborated on alot of things i didn't know about, for example he talked about changing the cover of some of his movies for ASDA, for example on four lions he had to change the cover because they thought the crow with the bomb on it was encouraging animal cruelty. then he went on to talk about the cover of dead man's shoes (Shane Meadows, 2004) and about how he thought many people may have bought the film due to the axe on the front, thinking its something like the film SAW

He then talked about the time it took to make all the 18 films they have made:

30 days preparation

30 days shooting

150 days post

210 days

10 hours a day

2100  week

18 times 2100 is 37500 hours of making films

Also where the money goes from box office earnings, this was a very interesting concept. now realising that the money the film companies get is very little. which has changed my ideas of the earnings of people like Barry:

• 1 million at box office
• exhibitors take 50%
• distributors take their p and a (200k) to promote 
• distributor splits whats left 5050
• the film company then has to pay back all equity finance
• the producers get 50% of total profit still only making half of profit after all these steps.

Danny cohen

The next masterclass was an interview, this interview was between Danny Cohen and Mariayah Kaderbhai. Danny Cohen been the person interviewed (cinematographer for working title) 

This masterclass was about how people making a film should make it. Saying things like you're never going too have enough resources or crew and you start small and make mistakes that then become something good, something you can work on. About doing things simple, when asked by someone in the audience about how he did one scene where people were floating off the ground, it was just fishing line. something very complicated made very simple!

 They showed many clips from  different films that Danny had been part of. Discussing what each film was like and how he did some of them. One thing i remember him saying was about how natural light was a cinematographers best friend. Danny Cohen has worked on many different films! including This is England and The King's Speach.

SEMIOTICS: THE CONCEPT + KEY TERMS

Signifier/Signified
Signifier= A detail we pick out which we think has a symbolic meaning
Signified= it is what we think it means

Denote/Connote
Denotation= a description of what we may see or hear
connotation= the symbolic meaning of these factual details

Binary opposition
Any mutually exclusive pair form a binary opposition (Male/Female Rural/Urban Rich/Poor)
Binary opposites are a key device for creating conflict and drama. when placed together, we can talk about binary opposites been juxtaposed- paired to emphasise the contrast; their difference

Polysemy/Anchorage
polysemic: it has many possible meanings .our interpretation will be influenced by our knowledge of other texts, genre, our values, cultural background, age, gender, etc. singnifiers are embedded in texts to point us towards a particular, preferred, interpretation.

Commutation test
Always consider what we don't see; the choices the producer has rejected.

Preferred/Contested/Oppositional Reading
prefered reading is what the producers wish us to follow, however all texts are polysemic so it can oppositonal or contested reading.

Narrative Enigma
Mysterious elemaents within a text to form a narrative enigma, needed in every drama.

Intertextual(ity)
Meaning of one text is tied to another, earlier text, e.g to fully understand scary movie  you'd need to have seen scream, which it spoofs. this can cause contested reading

Semiotics rap

Replay, this is my new semiotics rap.
This time i'm not going to talk a load of. 
First off is signified which is the same as connotation. 
However nothing like denotation.
We first find the signifier, something we think has a meaning.
it can be anything from a rose to a hair dryer.
Denotation is a description.
binary opposition, this is something like rick or poor,
people in different positions.
Commutation test is something we don't see,
anchorage makes you understand  it much more easily.
Narrative enigma we use for someone we dont want to see.
A polysemy image has more than one meaning, agree?

Assessing 2 past film openings

Here are the past 2 film openings i assessed:
Red Run:


idents
Here They used great special effects to create the 'flow' ident, it is obviously inspired by water and looks very effective.



Next is the LS29 Ident which is also very effective as it has great visual effects. The name also links in with the place. It looks clean and professional.

This is my favorite ident as it links in with the horror genre with the doll and the gun shot. the quality of the camera is also good despite the lack of editing.


Good qualities
The editing at the start with the kettle is really effective, the variety of camera shots are great. The plot is also very good for a film opening, with some quite clever camera work making the doll move, also with the editing of the sound of the doll! also the bra flinging on the doll is signifying something something sexual which i thinks a good effect

Bad qualities 
The acting in parts isn't very good, it's abit simple and not very convincing. The editing of the blood isn't very good as it looks fake and un-realistic, giving it a comedy element which is not what they were going for. however all in all i did really like this film opening.


Tiny Terror Film Opening:


The opening sequences starts with non-diegetic music playing from a piano, it's slow music and makes the audience feel uneasy so it gives this sense of horror genre. This non-diegetic music plays over the idents being revealed with a fade in fade out transition, and the idents are in block capitals which symbolizes the seriousness of this film.

This is the next ident to be revealed and it's revealed after the first ident with the transition of fade out form black.

This is the third ident and every ident has had it's own non-diegetic music to but have all been in block capitals.

The title of the film is then finally revealed with creepy non-diegetic sounds which is giving away the genre , and also the font is patchy with cuts and blood drips which makes it seem like a slasher genre and the colour of the font is red on a black background which makes it seem like a horror.


This point of view shot makes it seem like it's the view from the killer, but using narrative enigma by not revealing who it is giving this sense of mystery. Also using non-diegetic sounds to give again the sense of horror.

This scene shows the girl's bedroom and we get the impression from her with the mise-en-scene of how her bedroom is decorated, etc. It's also a two shot showing the relationship with the two characters.

Assessment Criteria

G321 - Simplified Marking Criteria as 1 Sheet